Location: I live in on the Rosamond Skypark (CA) and am married to Victoria (Tuppergal).

Posts: 999

Rosie & Tuppergal’s Caribbean Trip 2013

Ever since our first trip to the Caribbean in 2004 with mentor Jim "Jimmyb" Baker, I’ve made it a life-long-goal to try and get back every other year, and so far it’s still happening; 2005, 2007, 2009, 2011 and now 2013!!!!

Our one-month-long vacation started on Saturday, April 6th and will take Tuppergal & I to the Turks & Caicos where we'll continue on and fly around the Caribbean Islands (and fly within 20nm of South America). Why…because we can! Life is TOO SHORT, and I NEVER want to say, “I sure wish I would have……..”

After spending so much time vacationing on “Island Time”, I can see why people sell everything and move down there My retirement fantasy is to sell EVERYTHING, move to the Caribbean and work at Dive Shop or be a handyman!

My pictures start on page 4, and I hope to post each evening (when I have internet access).

Our group this year includes seasoned over-water veterans and a couple of newbies who I look forward to flying with;

Ten planes are starting out April 9th from Homestead to vacation on Grand Turk and one more RV will join the group on Grand Turk on April 13th. There is a chance my skypark neighbors Doug & Gail Dodson may join us for a short time as they are flying to Brazil so Doug can land his Glasair below the equator (with Sharkbait).

From Grand Turk, four RVs will depart on April 12th and continue to the British Virgin Islands (BVI), Dominican Republic, Curaçao, Bonaire, Grenada and up the Lesser Antilles Island chain for ONE BIG MONTH-LONG LOOP around the Caribbean! I'm thinking we may take a day while in the BVI to clear Customs back to the USA at St. Thomas, and island-hop the USVI and Puerto Rico "just because it would be fun"!

Here's the Great Circle routing (not all landing destinations displayed as I used this for planning only):

Here's a better depiction of the Lesser Antilles in the Caribbean Sea. LOTS of water from the Dominican Republic to Curaçao and then Bonaire to Grenada (Bonaire is the small island to the right of Curaçao):

Here are the dates for the Caribbean Adventure, and by the way, we only have reservations set-in-stone for Grand Turk (my favorite hotel) and the British Virgin Islands (winging-it at its best!);

Grand Turk: April 9-12
Virgin Gorda (BVI): April 12-17
Dominican Republic : April 17-19
Bonaire: April 19-22
Grenada: April 22-23 (will meet up with Sharkbait after his ‘equator run’)
OPEN (Island hopping northbound up the Antilles - we have no reservations anywhere): April 23-May 1
Dominican Republic or Providenciales: By the evening of May 2
Florida: May 3
Texas: May 4
Home to California: May 5
Back to work: May 6

I hope you all can follow along, especially on the two days of our biggest open water flights;

April 19: Dominican Republic to Curaçao to Bonaire (416nm)
April 22: Bonaire to Grenada (381nm)

If you are flying, fly safe!
And if you are building, “Keep poundin’ them rivets because it’s ALL WORTH IT!!!” Rosie & Tuppergal

PS: Planning will start during this trip for Cayman Islands/Belize 2015!

**************Update: We completed the trip and arrived home safely on May 5th after flying 9405 nautical miles over 70 hours with landings on 23 islands Read on to see how much FUN we had!

You will probably be in a rush to get home and not have the timing right, but the Central Texas Airshow will be ongoing at Temple (TPL) on Sat, 4 May. Falcon Flight will be performing. Drop in before TFR and enjoy the show.

From Rosie: I'll be departing from Fort Pierce (KFPR) on that Saturday morning Falcon and may be a bit late

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